The Spoils of War
by DeniseV
Summary: It was a puzzle more easily figured out than they thought.


Well, as all of you know who read my stories, I just adore Ezra Standish. And I love his horse, and I have, with affection and gratitude to the person who first called him this, taken up calling him Chaucer. And I also have read in several stories about Ezra's horse's sweet tooth. I have adopted that characteristic as well. This is just a short little thing. All of the Seven play a part, Ezra both the smallest and largest, depending on your point of view. And Chaucer gets a moment to shine, too. Enjoy.

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><p>J.D. Dunne practically skidded to a stop on his boot heels in front of five of the other lawmen that made up the Magnificent Seven, the group that Judge Orin Travis convinced to stay and protect the town of Four Corners. It was just more than three years now since that auspicious day, and there could be little doubt, whether by action or by reputation, that the presence of these men in the rapidly expanding desert town had made a difference. They kept the peace, news of which had spread enough so that more families were moving to the area, more businesses were opening up, and what was once a dusty backwater village, a tiny dot on a map that hardly qualified for a label, was now a place that seemed destined to be there for the duration, a frontier town that actually had a future, no longer likely to become a ghost town as so many others already had.<p>

"What the hell, kid!" Buck Wilmington said, irritated that his friend had come just shy of knocking his beer into his lap. The lovely Miss Bernadette, with whom the resident Lothario had a rendezvous shortly, would not look too kindly at him walking in reeking of the foamy brew.

"Shouldn't run around like that, J.D. You might get hurt," Josiah Sanchez said reasonably.

"I ain't no kid," he parried back to Buck. "And I wasn't runnin'," he told the former preacher.

"Yeah, right," Buck countered.

"Josiah's right, J.D. You coulda hurt yourself, or someone else," Nathan Jackson, the resident healer, said as he looked toward Inez Recillos serving another customer. J.D.'s eyes grew huge as he realized how his recklessness might have turned out.

"You were in a hurry to get here, J.D.," Chris Larabee, their leader, said, deciding that the young man had been upbraided enough by his fellow lawmen. "What's wrong?" he asked as he took a long draw from his mug of coffee.

"Casey says they just received a delivery."

"Did they arrive?" Nathan asked. He watched as the former buffalo hunter, Vin Tanner, stood from his chair and put on his coat and hat. The handsome Texan waited at the table to hear the answer.

"She said they got some in, but not as many as usual. Mrs. Potter said they must be on back order."

"But there is some?" Vin asked.

"Yeah."

"All right. I was headin' over. Can you pick 'em up and meet me?" Vin asked J.D.

"I'll go get 'em," Chris offered. "J.D., the jail is all yours," the blond added. They were still patrolling the town, but not as a routine. The town's population had grown such that more families, with fathers and mothers who understood the benefit of community, had actually made the town more peaceful. During times of necessity – bad weather, up front knowledge of criminal activity on the way, when the town was unusually crowded, for whatever reason – Chris would set up the familiar schedule that put the seven back on shifts. For now, though, there were no patrols, which was a good thing since they were currently down one lawman.

The jail did need tending, at least long enough for J.D. to get Rufus King woken up and let out. He'd caused quite a ruckus at the saloon the previous night, picking fights in his drunken rampage. By the time he'd met up with J.D., after being ignored by everyone else so far, he'd gotten himself into quite an outraged state. They had all been present and watching for that moment when Rufus had picked up the bottle from someone else's table. All of them save one Ezra P. Standish, who had taken a break from his lucrative poker night to relieve himself of some of his winnings to the safety of his hidden safe spot within his room, and then hit the outhouse to relieve himself in a different fashion.

As he came back through the hallway from the rear of the building and made his way into the saloon, a smile on his face as he adjusted the cuffs on his shirt, he missed seeing the commotion in progress. The split second he had to react to the inevitable was simply not enough time. He moved his head so as not to take a direct and undoubtedly fatal hit as Rufus took the bottle and swung it straight for J.D.'s head. Ezra pushed the sheriff aside, leaving the gambler directly in the path of the large, drunk, small-time rancher. The bottle connected with Ezra's head, just behind his ear. It was a stunning blow to witness, and no one was surprised when the con man crashed straight to the floor. Buck and Josiah gathered the intoxicated rancher and took him, kicking, screaming and spitting mad, to the jail; he would need the rest of the night and much of the next day before any of them would hear anything coherent from the man. Unfortunately, as had happened several previous times, he would wake with no memory of what he had done. Nobody had been injured in those previous episodes. This time was different, very different. Something would need to be done, but keeping him locked up now was not the answer. When he wasn't drunk Rufus King was known as a kind, gentle man. His demons were haunting him more, now, with more serious ramifications.

Nathan rushed to Ezra's side. He was out cold. Nathan gave him a quick look, trying to bring the injured man to consciousness. Having no luck, but relieved that he was still among the living, Chris and Nathan prepared to cart the injured man up to his room above the saloon when Ezra showed signs that he might finally be coming to. His eyes moved under his lids, he moaned and grimaced, obvious signs of pain, and then he opened his eyes. He looked at Chris, and then at Nathan, though he didn't seem to truly recognize either of them, and then took a wary, woozy glance around at his surroundings, seeming to look straight through Vin and J.D. as they hovered worriedly near the bar. He grimaced once more and then closed his eyes. They started to lift him once again when Ezra said something. It was near a whisper. Everything, including his heartbeat, was sounding ten times louder than normal.

"What'd ya say, Ezra?" Chris asked.

"Miss … P'ar … chaw … tree," he said. And then he fainted.

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><p>Nathan shook his head as he watched his friend sleep the next morning. It had taken the rest of the day and into the nighttime hours before Ezra came to again, but that had only been long enough for the former slave to do a quick examination and get a couple of glasses of water and a cup of tea into him. He managed to ask his patient if he knew his name, the answer leaving him with mixed feelings. Ezra Simpson was a name the con man had used in his past, but it had been over three years, at least to Nathan's knowledge, since Ezra had used any aliases. His other friends had asked the healer to ask him what he meant by his cryptic comment before he'd passed out in the saloon, but Nathan knew he'd be getting nothing sensible out of the gambler for a while longer. He felt confident that Ezra would be all right with the one response he'd gotten, and that the southerner, gentlemanly as always, thanked him – by name … his given name – before falling back to sleep.<p>

So that left the remainder of the seven to figure out the puzzle. And figure it out they did.

"It's always about that damned horse," Vin had said the previous night with a shake of the head. They'd come to a conclusion about what Ezra had said over a late dinner. Now, as they lolled about waiting for an appropriate time to head to their midday meal, J.D. had come running in with his news, thus precipitating the change in plans.

Vin knew what he would be doing as soon as they heard if Mrs. Potter had received the order, which finally arrived a week later than she thought it would. Ten minutes later, as he was in the middle of grooming his hurt friend's horse, Chris walked into the livery.

"Got 'em?" the tracker asked with a grin.

"Yeah," Chris answered irritably. He could hardly believe he was doing this. The 'notorious' Chris Larabee, stopping at Potter's store to pick up peppermints. For a horse. For a horse that wasn't even his. "Knocked senseless and all he's worried about is that someone go get his candy for his horse before some kid got to it first."

"He don't ask for much," Vin said as he continued to brush the horse down. Vin was pretty sure Ezra's horse would prefer a good grooming to sex, even if he hadn't been, well, you know …

"That ain't exactly true," Chris said as he opened the bag of candies. Chaucer's ears pricked up at the noise, excited at hearing the familiar dull crinkle of the wrapping. And it was true, Ezra did ask for every damned thing, but somehow seemed satisfied , and at times downright amused, that he continued to get nothing. Nothing, that is, but what he'd found he was happy to settle for: the friendship of good men, the freedom to continue to make a living at something he loved – poker simply being in his blood – and his job as a lawman, something he had grown to enjoy, in the company of his fellows. The fact that it became more of a part-time affair as he took on more responsibilities as a citizen of his chosen home, made the whole thing more satisfying. He lived in a town filled with people who, more and more, trusted him, looked up to him, made him proud; all things he never thought that he would find, that his mother and his upbringing told him did not exist. Four Corners was now his home; the man felt spoiled rotten by all of the good that had come of his fortuitous waltz into town three years previous. Vin and Chris had been privy to a mildy and happily intoxicated Ezra when he'd told them these things. 'The spoils of war', Ezra had said, because he had fought so long the pull of the town … of friendship … of belonging. They were both certain that the other people here who knew the southern gentleman well – Buck, Josiah, Nathan and J.D., Mary Travis and Inez Recillos, Mrs. Potter, Casey and Nettie Wells, the fellas at the livery who Ezra tipped extravagantly in order to keep his horse living like a king – could sense it in his demeanor, in the twinkle in his eyes … and from the gold tooth as it glimmered with the increased levels of smiling and laughter coming from the man these days. Cracks to the head by drunks notwithstanding, Ezra Standish was a truly happy man.

Vin shrugged at his reply. "Mebbe. But he's still here, and it don't seem he cares ta be anywhere else. That suits me fine," he added as the blond gunman offered a peppermint to Ezra's horse. "Know you feel the same," he added as he watched his friend offer a second treat to the seemingly insatiable Chaucer, and then gave him a firm rub behind the ear, just where the spoiled horse liked it.

"I do, but I don't think he needs to know that," Chris said as he handed the bag of candies to the tracker and left the livery. Vin put the bag in his pants pocket and watched his friend leave, smiled a wider smile and went back to assuring that Ezra's horse stayed as happy as his master.

"He knows," he said out loud to Chris' comment, even though Chris was already out of earshot. Then he leaned in and in a conspiratorial tone, asked Chaucer, "Don't he?" The beautiful animal nodded his head vigorously, as though answering, and then leaned down and tried to nibble Vin's pocket. "Knock it off," he said, pushing the horse back as he continued his gift to his friend.

The End.


End file.
